Patricia G McNeely

Eyewitnesses to General W.T. Sherman's Atrocities in the Civil War Patricia G McNeely

General William T. Sherman went to great lengths during the burning of Columbia, South Carolina, to protect his "particular friend Miss Poyas," whose family he visited frequently while he was a bachelor stationed at Fort Moultrie between 1842 and 1846. The book and letters that Sherman signed and gave to her before, during and after the Civil War, along with an eyewitness account of his visits, have been privately saved for more than 150 years by descendants of Mary Catherine Poyas Walker. Recently released, the documents, along with other eyewitness accounts, provide significant new insight into Sherman's personal life as well as evidence of the atrocities committed by his troops in his military, economic and psychological war on civilians in Georgia and the Carolinas. The documents and eyewitnesses also finally and convincingly end the 150-year-old controversy about who burned Columbia. Admitting his strategy to destroy towns in his path rather than leaving occupying forces, Sherman told Mary Catherine that he "had not wanted to burn the town, it was such a pretty place," but "could leave no part" of his army to keep it.